In the first place, most chemists work with materials whose chemical formulae are fairly simple, and in which the ratio of the numbers of atoms of one kind to the numbers of atoms of another are small integers, or fractions of small integers. Among such compounds are NaCl, Al203 and Si02• By contrast, the geochemist often stud…
A century has passed since the first X-ray diffraction experiment (Friedrich et al.1912). During this time, X-ray diffraction has become a commonly .used technique for the identification and characterization of materials and the field has seen continuous development. Advances in the theory ofdiffraction, in the generation o…